April Charlton Lee Central Coast Newspapers

April Charlton contributes to all four community papers owned by Lee Central Coast Newspapers. She primarily covers hard news, such as cops and courts and county and city government. She also writes features on community living, health and wellness. Charlton says she is interested in story ideas that have “value to our readers” such as “something interesting somebody did in the community” or a story related to local government. She covers only local stories and does NOT pay attention to pitches that fall outside her coverage area.

Pitch her by e-mail. “We publish a daily paper, so we have a daily deadline of 5 p.m., and then we also publish weekly papers,” she says. Her deadline varies depending on which publication she’s writing for.